FSU-to-Big-12 rumors doused? President says expect no new news coming

SARASOTA — If you think Florida State is moving from the ACC to the Big 12 sometime this summer, school president Eric Barron has a message for you: fat chance.

While he may not have used those exact words, they more than adequately sum up his comments to reporters immediately following the university's board of trustees meeting here Friday morning.

"We're not seeking anything. We're not expecting anything. There are no conversations going on (with the Big 12)," Barron said, reiterating comments he has made at other points during a conference realignment drama that has taken on several twists and turns that he argues have been out of his control.

"There are a lot of reasons why conference issues are in the news," Barron added. "More money is one of them. Another one, quite frankly, is sort of a feeding frenzy over this particular topic. It gets a lot of people's attention, and they have a lot of opinions."

There was no mention of the Big 12 during Friday's meeting.

Barron's comments were echoed by new trustee board chairman Allan Bense, who said the trustee board has not — contrary to widely-accepted opinion — had conversations about switching conferences.

"When I began getting emails, I called President Barron, and he told me what he's said. There's been no — and I give you my word, I'm the former Speaker of the House (of Florida) and I never got caught lying in two years, because I learned, if the media asks you a question, and it ain't good, don't lie.

"I promise you, we have not chatted or talked."

Bense was named new chairman during Friday's meeting.

To some, the latter portion of Bense's statement may run somewhat counter to what outgoing trustee board chairman Andy Haggard said May 12, when he told Warchant.com that the board "unanimously would be in favor of seeing what the Big 12 has to offer." Many originally believed Haggard's insinuation was that the board had spoken on the matter.

Since those comments, though, for the past month, Haggard, Barron and other university leaders have spent the past month refuting other online reports that they are considering a move out of the ACC and to the Big 12. Barron even crafted a form email to fans and alumni who had been asking him about conference realignment, in which he assessed the pros and cons of such a departure.

It was clear in his memo that for now, he favors staying in the ACC, while keeping open the door for any potential opportunities with other conferences.

"This is the way to think about it: We have a happy existence (in the ACC)," Barron said. "Like anybody else, we would like more money. We have a lot of opportunities for more money."

Bense added: "We just need to be thoughtful. We need to be deliberate. But we need to be ready to act. We need to be very thoughtful and deliberate."

Proponents of a move to the Big 12 have based their thoughts on the widely-accepted assumption that the Big 12 would offer FSU more money through shared television revenues and the like, than the ACC will.

On Friday, FSU athletics director Randy Spetman announced to the board of trustees, that his department on June 1 received approximately $1.6 million more from the ACC than it had anticipated. Early projections from the conference were that member schools would receive about $14 million per year. It now appears that due to fixes to end-of-fiscal-year budgets, the conference may be paying the schools up to $17 million per year.

"I would say it's significant," Spetman said about how the additional money will help his programs.

When asked if there was reason for reporters and fans to continue watching the Big 12 drama play out through the middle of August, Barron said simply: "No."

August 15 is the date the Seminoles would have to tell the ACC they were leaving in order to join the Big 12 for competition next year.